


Like I was Never There

by smokesprite



Series: Like I was Never There [1]
Category: All For The Game - Nora Sakavic
Genre: Alternate Universe - Supernatural Elements, Monsters as graverobbers, Neil as a nameless something, explicit language in the form of cussing and threats, it'll be fun, jeremy is an immortal sunshine, renee is trapped in a mirror, there are a lot of people trapped in a lot of places
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-07
Updated: 2017-10-18
Packaged: 2018-12-12 09:57:44
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 5
Words: 10,801
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11734677
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/smokesprite/pseuds/smokesprite
Summary: “He’s alive!” Nicky gasped. “By God, how long were you down there?”“He was buried three days ago.” Supplied another of the grave robbers, shovel slung over one shoulder.“Good thing we decided to rob him when we did,” a fourth voice made itself known. He didn’t say it like it was a particularly good thing. Neil felt himself grabbed and hefted out of the coffin, his legs proving useless. “I don’t suppose you were buried with anything of value.”





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Here, have another weird au  
> The title is taken from “My Friends” by Oh Wonder

Neil felt the scratch of unfamiliar clothes, sensed the earth moving to swallow him, and knew it could only mean one thing.

He’d been buried again.

It happened every few centuries; he’d fall asleep and wake up to the dark silence of a coffin. He had several options, but he wasn’t in any rush to pursue them. Actually, one of his options was to just wait until the land spit him out again.

Neil had done that, once, and it had led to a memorably tempestuous trip to the depths of an ocean. He did not relish the idea of his lungs filled with water, his body bloating and the long trip back to shore.

But, neither did he relish the idea of digging.

He let himself drift into sleep for a while longer, but it was uncomfortably light. It felt like he woke for every earthworm that passed by. He’d had all the rest he would get for the time being, and it became increasingly apparent that he would have to get a move on if he didn’t want to sink too far to reach the surface again.

However, as the lid of his coffin was peeled away, a third option was revealed to him.

Grave robbers really were the best of people, Neil thought as he sat up and one of the men beside his grave began to scream.

“Nicky! _Shut up_!” another hissed and slapped a hand over the screaming man’s mouth.

“He’s alive!” Nicky gasped. “By God, how long were you down there?”

“He was buried three days ago.” Supplied another of the grave robbers, shovel slung over one shoulder.

“Good thing we decided to rob him when we did,” a fourth voice made itself known. He didn’t say it like it was a particularly good thing. Neil felt himself grabbed and hefted out of the coffin, his legs proving useless. “I don’t suppose you were buried with anything of value.”

“Probably not.” Neil shrugged, and the extraordinarily strong, short man that had Neil by the collar let him crumple to the ground.

“That’s a shame.”

The tall one with the shovel hmphed. There was something vaguely familiar about his face, something about the shape of the jaw, but most humans had jaws and Neil didn’t dwell. “It’s not too late. We could still try the woman a few plots over.”

The noisy one immediately protested, “We’ve already done so much work.”

“And we have nothing to show for it,” the tall one started poking at the second grave with his shovel, testing the ground.

“C’mon, Kevin.”

“Get to work.” Kevin ordered curtly.

 _Kevin_ , a shot of adrenaline jolted Neil. Where did he— _oh_ , it was _that_ Kevin. Only, wasn’t _that_ Kevin supposed to be locked away in the darkest depths of an inescapable prison? Life on the surface was confusing, but Neil supposed he could always climb back into the coffin if it got to be too much.

The one who’d pulled Neil from the grave leaned forward. His face filled Neil’s field of vision, eclipsing the sky like a moon with two piercing eyes.

“You’re not in shock,” he commented.

“No,” Neil answered.

“You haven’t asked for food and water.”

“May I have food and water?” Neil asked.

The man let a few heartbeats pass before tossing him a canteen and grabbing another shovel.

The men worked together for a while before Nicky stopped his work to lean on his shovel and chatter with the others.

“Stuff like this wouldn’t happen if you were the town doctor, Aaron.”

“Shut up.”

Nicky hesitated, sized the other two up for conversation, and turned to Neil. “You’re not going to report us, or anything, are you?”

“Report what?”

“Exactly,” Nicky winked.

Neil had seen people robbed before. He wasn’t one to bother with human authorities, and the woman was dead, so what did it really matter?

“You’re a drifter, right?” Nicky asked. “There were a few rocks, but not much in the way of a gravestone. And no name or anything—Aaron works here, he checked.”

“Nicky,” Aaron hissed. “Shut up.”

“He already said he’s not telling.” Nicky reasoned. “How’d you die?”

“I didn’t.” Neil replied.

“Well, obviously. I mean, how did they think you died?”

“I went to sleep.” Neil thought on it, trying to remember it. “I fell off a horse. Into the street. There was…a wagon.”

“You were hit by a wagon?” Nicky looked him up and down.

“I guess.” Neil wasn’t too concerned. “Where’s the road out of town?”

“Ummm…” Nicky looked around and pointed. “That way. What are you—Whoah, you can’t just leave. Andrew, he’s trying to leave.”

Neil struggled to stand, and found he couldn’t.

Well, this was inconvenient.

“You got hit by a wagon, idiot,” Andrew came forward.

“I can’t move my legs.” Neil said.

“We noticed.”

Neil scowled. “I’ll heal. Could you leave me in a bush somewhere?”

“A bush?” Nicky asked incredulously.

“Well-hidden enough that no one will find me.” Neil clarified.

“Your legs don’t work and your first instinct is to wait out paralysis in a bush?” Nicky gestured wildly while Andrew leaned on his shovel and appraised Neil. “Are you sure you didn’t bump your head as well?”

“I know I did. Actually, I think I snapped my neck,” Neil strained but the memory was fuzzy. Not that it mattered now, anyway.

“Funny,” Nicky nervously faked a laugh. “What’re you, a vampire?”

“No,” Neil replied. Close, but no. “We’re near Foxvale,” the thought came to him.

“Yes. About a mile,” Nicky said slowly.

“Would you mind taking me somewhere?” Neil asked. “I could pay you.”

“He can pay us, he says,” Nicky perked up, looking to the others.

“Good,” Aaron started kicking dirt into the grave they’d just dug up. “Because a string of fake pearls and a monogramed handkerchief doesn’t buy dinner.”

“You’re the one who chose the graves,” Kevin scowled. “You’re the one who said—”

“I know what I said.” Aaron grunted and worked faster. “Guess the Milltons weren’t as well off as they appeared. It’s been a bad night.”

“Load him into the cart,” Andrew ordered Nicky, but didn’t tear his eyes from Neil. He bent forward to look at Neil. “We dump you where you want and you pay us in gold?”

Neil shrugged. “Sure.”

It didn’t matter to him.

           

xxx

Neil crouched in the shadow of the ruins and tried not to get lost in the monochrome landscape.

There had been a time, years ago, when this castle had been rich with color. The rugs, the drapes, and then the fire and blood. It was masochistic that he still visited, that he went out of his way like this. He wasn’t even sure why he made himself remember, just that he didn’t want to forget.

And forget he would.

His memories had a way of blowing away with the wind the longer he walked the earth.

Something pulled at him, but he was distracted by Nicky’s voice.

“Are you sure you’re not a vampire? There are…stories about this place.”

“This crap-hole was picked over for all it was worth years ago and you have nothing. How do you think you’re going to pay us?” Aaron demanded.

“There is a well out back,” Neil said. “Lower the bucket and wait until the moon has passed across the sky. At dawn, reel it up.”

Aaron blinked. “We’re not stupid. We know what water is, and there are much easier ways of finding it.”

“You haven’t even seen what comes out of the well, why do you assume it will be water?” Neil wondered. “Take your payment. I’m not going anywhere, if you don’t like what you find I’ll offer something else.”

“Something else would be nice.” Nicky said.

“He’ll offer us mouse dung next.” Aaron said scathingly. Then, mockingly, “ _’Go to the stairwell, leave a block of cheese, and come back in a week.’_ ”

“Find the well. Lower the bucket.” Kevin ordered.

“What?” Aaron looked at Kevin incredulously.

“Just do it. We’ll need water by morning anyway.” From the way Kevin stood, tense and eyes locked on Neil, Neil figured Kevin had finally recognized him. Did Kevin think Neil had been locked away, too?

“We’re staying the night?” Nicky looked doubtful.

“Yes.” Andrew slid down to sit across from Neil.

When it was clear neither Kevin nor Andrew would say more, Aaron huffed and went around to the back, taking Nicky with him. Kevin stepped further into the house, looked back once, then walked through into the entryway and hovered nervously.

It was clear he wanted a minute alone with Neil, but Andrew didn’t move and after a moment, Kevin unsheathed a knife and ventured further into the house.

“What’s your game, anyway?” Andrew said when they were alone.

“No game. I keep my word.” Neil replied.

Then, there was no sound but the night.

The house creaked and moaned, like it always did, and sometimes there were screams but not on this night. Neil wondered if his father had given up, or if he was saving his strength. Kevin had made it out of his prison, would his father soon find a way out of his? It was supposed to be impossible but…what if the seals were weakening?

Time wasn’t supposed to matter to magic like this, to people like Neil. Had the passing millennia betrayed them all?

“There is a well out back, but it was completely covered in plants and spiders and shit. That rope is going to snap if we try and haul up a whole bucket of water.” Nicky said when they got back. “We should really take him to see a doctor.”

“Not that we’d have a way to pay,” Aaron reminded everyone.

“You could take a look at him,” Nicky suggested.

“I’m not a doctor,” Aaron said bitterly.

The house whistled. Neil listened for words, but the wind remained formless.

Nicky shivered. “Kevin’s not back yet?”

“Kevin wanted to be alone.” Andrew said and gestured further into the house. “He went that way.”

“Kevin’s crazy,” Nicky rubbed his arms as if that would chase away the chill.

Slowly, Aaron and Nicky drifted. Unwilling to brave the house, they made themselves at home in a corner, huddled for warmth, and fell asleep despite Nicky’s insistence that he wouldn’t. Andrew stayed alert all night, although at some point he decided Neil was no longer worth glaring at.

Neil let himself turn into nothing, a wisp in existence, gone but for the slightest breath.

Then, near dawn, Kevin came in and kicked the others awake. “Go get water. We’ll need breakfast; we can make a broth or some shit. Tea, at the least.”

“Or a bath,” Nicky groaned, rolled over, and fell back asleep.

“It has to be at the exact breaking of dawn.” Neil reminded them.

“I’ll do it myself,” Kevin huffed, although Neil suspected he hadn’t paid heed to Neil’s instructions.

They waited in silence until Kevin burst back in, cradling the well bucket.

“Some well,” Kevin said it like it was a demand on Neil.

“What?” Nicky jerked awake.

“Quiet.” Aaron ordered.

“Look,” Kevin upended the bucket and gold coins came spilling out onto the floor.

There was a moment of silence after the clanking stopped.

“Are you a leprechaun?” Nicky sounded stunned.

“Vampire. Leprechaun,” Neil was slightly amused. He didn’t have a name, not a real one, not that he could remember.

“He’s like Kevin,” Aaron’s eyes narrowed on Neil.

“Obviously not, or we wouldn’t be stuck robbing graves,” Nicky speculated, still focused on the gold.

“Take your payment and leave me.”

“No.” Andrew said, his eyes sharp again.

“No?” Nicky ogled.

“You said if we didn’t like our payment, you would offer something else,” Andrew reminded Neil. “Well, I don’t like it.”

“ _You_ don’t like it.” Nicky said. “I’ll take my share and be on my way, thanks.”

“Fine,” Neil said.

Nicky and Aaron both pocketed their fourth. Kevin, after a moment of hesitation, did the same. Andrew, however, let the gold rest on the floor of the entry way. It slowly sunk into the floorboards, and Nicky nervously checked his pockets.

“It’s not going to disappear, is it?”

“No.” Neil cocked his head. “Now, go.”

The three of them hesitated.

“We really can’t just…leave him, you know.” Nicky argued.

“Yes you can.” Andrew told them.

“Oh. We can?”

“You’re a town away,” Andrew said. “You can come looking for my body later. Right now, this man has another offer to make.”

It sounded like a challenge.


	2. Chapter 2

Neil had decided long ago that people were not worth knowing.

They had their own lives, however short, and Neil was happy to leave them to it. Given the chance to get involved, he would always refuse. But, when the three men had left, and it was just Neil and Andrew, Neil said almost curiously, “Do you not have a life to get back to?”

“They can manage without me,” Andrew said, which wasn’t really an answer. “What’s your new offer?”

“It was you who demanded I pay you in gold,” Neil pointed out.

“And it was you who said you’d offer something else if I didn’t like it.” Andrew reminded him.

Neil sighed. It was not often that a mortal made an effort to linger around Neil, and it was not often that Neil humored them. There was something... _unnerving_ in Andrew’s eyes so Neil thought on it.

What could this man want more than gold?

“There is an armchair in a room with three windows. Cut into the back of the chair—it shouldn’t be difficult, it’s probably burned to the bones anyway. You will find a box.”

“Where’s the room?”

Neil started to answer and realized he had no idea. “It’s been a while. Walk the halls and I’m sure you’ll find it.”

Andrew looked unimpressed, but did as he was told.

Neil waited for Andrew to come back, and occupied his time with trying to feel his legs. He could wiggle his toes, that was a good sign. Of course, once he got his legs back, there wasn’t going to be anything exciting. Just more of the same. Walking and walking, no real destination in mind.

It had been so long since he’d had to run, so long since there had been any urgency or threat behind any choice he’d made. But, seeing Kevin had been a shock; a shock he dreaded repeating.

Neil started to doubt the intelligence in letting a mortal wander around in this house. If he found the study…

Andrew returned empty handed.

“Let me think--” Neil insisted, but was interrupted by a scowling Andrew.

“Sheriff Wilds is here.”

A sharp rapping on the door frame preceded a stout, muscular woman. She took in their camp, then locked eyes with Andrew.

“I ran into Nicky on his way back into town,” it almost sounded like a threat.

“Catch him doing anything illegal?” Andrew didn’t say it like he cared.

“No,” She said wryly. Her eyes locked on Neil. “I’m Sheriff Wilds. I seem to remember burying you.”

“I don’t remember being buried,” Neil replied truthfully.

“Well,” She looked at him hard, searching for a lie. “You look familiar. Never mind. If you aren’t a dead man, I can’t let you stay here.”

“Why not?”

“It’s dangerous.”

“Not very,” Neil protested.

“Very,” Sheriff Wilds insisted.

He tried to argue, but Sheriff Wilds called backup in the form of a man named Boyd. Boyd was a very friendly giant. As he lifted Neil off the ground and into the back of the wagon, he started to chatter and Neil gratefully tuned out.

Sheriff Wilds checked on the horses and Andrew followed a few minutes later with an apple from the overgrown orchard. He looked slightly annoyed that they’d waited for him.

Neil thought there was something special about those apples, but then again maybe not. Like he’d said—it had been a while. His memories were as shuffled and dilapidated as the items in the house.

“Don’t know why you’d feel the need to squat here when Minyard has a perfectly fine cottage near town.” Boyd said conversationally.

“He’s not staying with me.” Andrew’s tone left no room for argument.

“Oh,” Boyd looked between them curiously. “Well. You could stay at the Inn.”

“Inn?” Neil tried to remember if Foxvale had ever had an Inn before. He’d always thought it too small and out of the way to need one. Most people unconsciously avoided the house on the hill, usually without ever knowing it was there.

Places with old magic were like that.

“You need to get checked out by Abby anyway. She’ll offer up a room, no doubt.”

“Who’s Abby?” Neil asked warily.

“Village doctor,” Matt said. “She’s married to the Innkeeper. Actually, the Innkeeper used to be the Sheriff--”

A Sheriff and a doctor? Sounded like two kinds of people who’d want to get involved in Neil’s business.

“I can find someplace else.”

“Umm…” Boyd seemed at a loss for a moment. “You know, Dan’s not going to let you go back to Wayhill Castle. That place is dangerous.”

Wayhill Castle? Is that what they were calling it now?

“It isn’t,” Neil insisted again.

“Most of it is charred and prone to collapse in at any second. It can hardly be called shelter.”

Neil suspected that place would never fall—not completely. No matter the state of disrepair, some remnant of it would remain through the ages, marking the land. The rickety jolting of the cart kept him from falling too deep into his own thoughts.

“Besides. Someone owns it.”

Neil scoffed.

Who would buy a place like that? Most mortals couldn’t even spend a night inside without waking up uneasy and being on edge for a week. No, he didn’t believe it, and even if someone owned it, they’d never visit.

Andrew jumped off without warning, not even a goodbye, and Matt warmly smiled at Neil.

“So, what’s your business with Andrew?”

Neil shrugged and didn’t say anything.

The town was nice, and for a moment Neil found himself wondering whose wagon he’d been hit by. He assumed Sheriff Wilds and Boyd would have had an easier time recognizing him if had been them, but there weren’t many other wagons.

Maybe a farmer. Neil had always liked farmers.

Eventually, they stopped outside of a clean looking building with herbs strung from the roof, and a garden crowding up to the front door. It was a nice sort of place that gave Neil a warm feeling. There was life here.

Too much life, it turned out, as the bar inside was extremely crowded and it took a fair bit of yelling for Boyd to get him a room. Then, almost immediately, a woman came to inspect Neil. The woman was cordial and sure of herself, and it took him a moment to realize that she was the doctor and not just some random woman touching him.

She asked Neil how his legs were, how he’d gotten injured, and if he had any other injuries. He provided vague responses to each question, not hiding the fact that he had something to hide. She moved him to a cot closer to her room, and Neil decided he needed to heal as soon as possible.

A night passed, and then another, and Neil resisted every attempt to get to know her. At least he and Innkeeper, Wymack, seemed to have an understanding; they rarely interacted.

Neil left on foot that third night—he had to admit, Abby knew what she was doing—and made the long hike to the manor.

He was grateful not to run into anyone from the town. They’d started imposing themselves on his existence and he didn’t appreciate it. However, once getting to the manor, he wasn’t so lucky.

Although his philosophy of not getting involved with people extended to the woman in the third floor bedroom, she was as much a part of the house as the walls.

Neil stood in the doorway and knocked twice before walking into the room and standing in front of a large, silver mirror with a long crack running down the side.

Renee graciously showed herself.

Neil had long ago stopped looking into mirrors, even this one. Renee was too much like a reflection. She was pale and barely there, translucent as he was hollow.

“You are alone again,” She remarked.

“I am,” Neil said, although he wanted to point out he’d always been alone.

“Andrew came back to look around. He didn’t find anything.” Into his silence, Renee added, “He could have.”

From anyone else, Neil might’ve taken that as a threat. But thinking of Andrew’s sharp eyes Neil simply agreed, “He could have.”

“Did you come back for something?”

“I still owe him payment. And I don’t know what he wants.”

“Not gold. Not jewels—I heard you try and lead him to your mother’s jewelry box.”

“I could let him look through the library. Not that there’s much left.”

“Not everything is ashes,” Renee said kindly.

“Hmm,” Neil said.

“There’s something else—” Renee started, but Neil turned toward the hallway. “Did you hear someone?”

“Almost,” Neil replied.

“Nathaniel, this is important—” But he didn’t want to discuss anything else. He kept his conversations with the woman in the mirror to a minimum, and it had been a long time since he’d had a conversation with anyone as Nathaniel.

He expected Boyd or Wilds, but was disconcerted to find Wymack.

The older man blocked the doorway completely, and Neil hadn’t realized how far into the room he’d come. Wymack’s eyes roved for a moment—taking in the cracked and dusty mirror, the remnants of wallpaper, and the bed that, when examined closely enough, might reveal bloodstains.

Of course, it was hard to say how much of that was Neil’s memory and how much was reality at any given moment. The bloodstains might not have been there.

“You nearly gave Abby a heart attack.”

“She’s a doctor.”

“I don’t appreciate it when patients try and kill my wife.”

“I don’t appreciate it when doctors think they have any say in how I go about my business.”

“And what business do you have here?” Wymack asked suspiciously.

“None, at the moment. We can go back to the Inn, if you move out of the doorway.”

Wymack moved, but his eyes didn’t leave Neil, and when he was returned safely to Abby she watched him like a hawk.

“He has a reflection,” Wymack told her helpfully before leaving the room, and returning to his regular policy of little to no interaction with Neil.

Neil could not stand to be in the common areas. There were too many souls, too much noise, and he avoided them. He was sure he’d engaged in several conversations, but the only one that stood out enough to remember was one with Boyd.

Boyd had mentioned, again, that someone owned Wayhill Castle, and added that she’d had plans to fix it up. She wasn’t local, however, and had underestimated the suspicion and stubborn resistance of every laborer in a ten mile radius to step foot in that house.

The renovations were permanently stalled.

After the twelfth day, with Abby’s blessing, Neil left through the back gate and walked until he found the small cottage Matt had described.

It was…surprisingly pleasant. It was small, like Andrew, and honeysuckle climbed the side of the building.

He wondered what Andrew did all day. No one had ever really said what he did for a living. They didn’t talk about him at all, except to ask what business he had with Neil.

He knocked, and waited, and fell asleep on the porch.

It felt good to sleep; he hadn’t since he’d woken up underground. He didn’t know how much time had passed when he was rudely kicked in the side.

“People are looking for you.” Andrew said.

“People found me.” Neil tried to sit up and realized at some point he’d rolled into the bushes.

“I’m not ‘people’. I don’t care what you do.”

Neil looked up and realized that at some point, it had become night.

“Except that I still owe you.” Neil reminded him. “Does that matter to you?”

“Not particularly. Get out of my bushes,” he said and brushed past Neil to go into the house. Neil started to follow, but the door was slammed in his face.

Neil took the hint, one for hints himself, and left a small stack of books in front of the door.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> More exposition, but I promise things are about to kick up a notch  
> (town name retroactively changed to Foxvale)


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you, thank you, thank you to everyone for the positive feedback! It keeps me going!

Neil shoved the post into the ground and kicked it for good measure. He would fix the fence, but he would also show the fence he hated it.

More than anything, Neil wanted to leave.

He wanted to leave all this—the people, the questions, the friendly handshakes—behind him, but he was forced to stay until his word to Andrew had been fulfilled. And would it ever be? Neil got the feeling the mortal would string this out for his own amusement until he died. Not a long time in the grand scheme of things, but long enough for Neil to suffer.

The sun was setting when Kevin appeared by his elbow. “Are we finally going to talk?”

“You did a good job of pretending like you didn’t know what was coming.” Neil started digging another hole for another post. “With the gold in the well.”

“I didn’t know,” Kevin claimed. “You have the strangest tricks up your sleeves, even for our kind.”

“You’re one to talk about strange. You made friends.”

Kevin grunted, neither denial nor agreement.

“I thought you’d been locked away with Riko.”

“I was. For centuries…” Kevin trailed off. “Some kids opened the door. I ran one way, Jean another. That’s not what I came here for. Is there a catch? Any weird magic on the gold?”

Neil thought on how to explain it. “You’ll live long enough to spend it all.”

“I’ll probably live forever, but what about the others? ‘Long enough to spend it all,’ what if it takes them three hundred years?”

Neil reflected on their drinking habits and snorted, “Then that’s how long they would live, not that that will ever be put to the test.”

“And if they blow it all on something tomorrow?” Kevin asked. A far more likely scenario.

“No promises about the next day.” Neil cocked his head. “If you’re so worried, hide one of their coins under the floorboards and take it out in a decade or so.”

Kevin nodded, and regarded Neil quietly.

“What?” Neil finally asked.

“What have you been doing all this time?”

The question brought Neil up short. He paused in his hole digging, the gap in the fence becoming increasingly symbolic. The sun sunk lower in the sky and still the answer eluded him.

“What, nothing? All the time in the world, free, and you can’t think of a single thing you did?”

“Forever is a long time. And I have a bad memory.”

“What?” Kevin asked incredulously. “You didn’t used to.”

“Time changes things.”

“Time isn’t supposed to change us,” Kevin argued.

“You left Riko, so it must have changed you.”

That brought Kevin up short.

He finally said. “I’m not even sure I knew I was running. You can’t know what it was like in that tomb. It was so dark…and cold and small. The door opened and I just…”

“Yeah,” Neil said.

He’d known that feeling, once.

“Are you really going to humor Andrew?”

“ _You_ humor Andrew.”

“Actually, he humors me.” Kevin corrected. “He was one of the kids who opened the tomb, you know. He chased after me and pinned me down, but not after getting a good hit on Riko when Riko attacked.”

Neil raised his eyebrows, surprised. It wasn’t often that a mortal kept its wits long enough to last in a fight with their kind. “Is that why you stayed?”

Kevin’s eyes snagged on Wymack as the older man walked out, and something clicked. The uneasy feeling that Wymack gave him, the odd looks they exchanged from across the room—Wymack was a witch.

“I found my father.” Then, Kevin corrected himself, “A reincarnation.”

“How can you be sure?” Neil wondered.

Kevin just shrugged.

“Get inside, you can finish this tomorrow,” Wymack called gruffly, unaware of what had just been said.

“Wait, one more question.” Kevin insisted before Neil went inside. “What…what about the Hatfords?”

“What about them?”

“Well… it was your mother’s family that created the tombs. It was your uncle who finally locked up your father. Are they…are they still around?”

The Hatfords were witches, and witches often got reincarnated--and, seeing as the Hatfords were a particularly powerful family, they had ways of being reborn to the same bloodline. Neil had kept an eye on them but after a couple hundred years of not seeing his mother… “I lost track of them.”

Kevin grunted, frustrated. “Will they lock me up if they see me? It was one of their lackeys that got me last time.”

Neil considered him carefully. There were witches who had intimate knowledge of the immortals, though not many these days. Neil couldn’t remember the last time anyone had given him trouble. “There are still a few of us out and about. Just make sure no one recognizes you."                                                                                                                

“Inside!” Wymack ordered again from the door. “It’s about to rain, and if you get soaked, you’re cleaning up after yourselves!”

Neil did as he was told.

He trudged through the narrow hallway into the common room and slouched over the bar, sinking back into his fugue. He would be stuck living in the Inn for the next forty years, evading Abby’s intrusive favors and Wymack’s careful gaze, doing handiwork to pay his stay. Which was what made it particularly incensing that Andrew was the one who served his drink.

As Neil had discovered the week before, Andrew was a bartender.

“What? Since when?” Neil had asked.

“Years.” Andrew had responded, unimpressed.

It was yet another reason for Neil to avoid the common areas.

“What were you and Kevin talking about?” Boyd was relaxed in the seat next to him. “The price of your new undead existence?”

Neil realized Boyd had been out there working on the fence with him, and for a moment wondered how that detail ever could have escaped him. But then, there was a lot about these people Neil tuned out. In the centuries it had been since anyone had actively tried to kill him, he’d grown careless.

Some days, the thought bothered Neil.

“Because those are the rumors, you know. People have always speculated about Kevin, and seeing him with someone who looks so much like the vagabond we just buried just gives them more to talk about. Especially given the Minyard’s rumored….graveyard activities.” Matt said this expectantly. It was a prompt, and one Neil never responded to.

“Nothing much,” He answered simply. Then, to Andrew, “Did you finish the books?”

“Yes.” Andrew replied impassively.

“And?”

“I wouldn’t read them twice.”

“Does that mean you are not satisfied?”

“No.”

Neil blew air out of his nostrils.

He was interrupted, or perhaps saved from further conversation when Boyd said, “You sure do have an awful lot of ‘nothing’ going on, Neil.”

Later that night, Kevin’s words about the tomb came back to him. He couldn’t shake them, and they bled into his thoughts until the sinking feeling in the pit of his stomach turned into a churning vortex.

Neil sat up and padded to the doorway. Outside he went, then up the hill, compelled to the manor at the top.

Neil wandered through the house, recalling the snippets of childhood that were left to him. He remembered his mother’s books, how the cold library floor felt under his bare feet, what it was like to curl up in the chair at _his_ end of the large walnut table. Watching his mother work was his most treasured pastime as a child. Sometimes he forgot that he _had_ ever been a child until he saw the charred slab of wood in the corner.

He remembered the good things, what few there were, but he remembered other things.

He remembered the fire. The smoke. The running.

He remembered what it felt like to be hunted, realizing that he was not meant to live free. Warring with the specter of his father, a shadow always looming over his shoulder, a threat always in the back of his mind.

He’d hated that feeling.

It had become a fact of life that Neil had vowed to have vengeance on--nevermind that the world worked without the permission of those who lived in it.

He remembered the back room, the one his mother had instructed him to avoid, the one he’d only been in once. He didn’t want to go there, he didn’t want to remember, but Kevin’s words beat at his skull and Boyd’s words nagged at the part of him that he’d closed off, the part that still felt like prey.

Eventually, his feet led him there, and he paused for a steadying breath outside of the door.

Better preserved than the rest of the house, it most closely resembled the images in Neil’s memory. This had been his father’s study, and the basement that yawned beneath the house was only accessible from a narrow door tucked behind the desk.

Basement. Workspace. Tomb.

Something was wrong.

The air was still, unnaturally still, and Neil’s heart bounded down into his stomach then up into his throat and back down again while his breathing halted completely.

The door in the wall was open.

His father was out.


	4. Chapter 4

The ballroom hummed with a mellow light that cast harsh faces gently, like a mask.

Neil wasn’t fooled, he wasn’t taken in, but he was contending with a rather fierce ache in his chest.

Riko stood across the marbled floor with his pets. Kevin, his serious face familiar after years of gifted immortality, and the new one, Jean, whose face was about to become as unchanging as the rest of theirs. He looked uncertain, unnerved by the crowd, and Neil wondered if his expression would be stuck like that.

Jean looked down at the cider and swirled it around in the glass, licking his lips, before remembering it was rude to refuse a gift and taking a sip.

A few more of those and he would be a permanent fixture.

Neil would never have a pet, and he would never be one; his mother and father had discussed both options at length and continued to do so every new moon. Last moon it had gotten violent. Neil was of the opinion that this was a war his father would win.

His mother's family were witches, close knit and powerful. But witches, no matter how powerful they were, had come later, and they would always be closer to mortals.

And Neil took after his father.

It wasn’t so bad being alone, except that every once in awhile a pit inside of him would open up, yawning and gaping and sucking Neil in. He would tell himself that he was a solitary creature, that life was meant to be this way, that eternals did not need any company but the wind, and the earth, and the sky.

He was eternal, he would last forever, the world whispered to him secrets that it kept from the men in the valley.

Jean took another tentative sip, perhaps concluding the cider was not poisoned.

 _They are useful, but they won’t last long,_ his father had said. Neil knew it was true, humanity would be short lived, but apparently they would last long enough to make Neil unforgivably jealous.

When there was a lull in the conversation, Neil might lean over and say, _Jeremy doesn’t come to these things anymore,_ and Kevin would be just a bit less solid.

No.

No, Neil was not cruel.

Riko would say it though, later, when he was alone with his pets, reminding Kevin that at least they had each other.

Jeremy had been one of the few good souls among the eternals, with an affinity for sunshine and stargazing, and a fondness for the men in the valley. He championed friendship and working together, ideas that had been all too foreign for him to be allowed to remain.

Neil had no idea where Jeremy had gone, in the same way he had no idea where his father, or Kengo Moriyama, or any of them had come from. He supposed they must have come from somewhere, but maybe not. As Nathan liked to tell it, he stepped from the mountains exactly as he was: With purpose and with knowledge.

Neil existed to walk the earth.

His father had existed to rule it.

-0-

This was not walking.

This wasn’t even the world.

The inside of the cell was as plain as the coffin had been, and this time, Neil was not content to wait.

“How long had that door been open?” Neil demanded of Sheriff Wilds when she entered, looking exhausted.

Apparently, knocking Sheriff Wild’s door down at three in the morning was alarming, and it crossed the threshold into suspicious when the room he was wildly interrogating her about turned out to be on private property, with a dead body in it.

“Is that him?” Demanded a watery-eyed woman in a rich fur coat. Her gaze locked on him and Neil found a hard stone under the tears. There was intense hatred there, but he ignored it in favor of Sheriff Wilds.

“How long had that door been open?”

“Door, what door? Look at me, you murdering bastard.” The woman demanded.

“Allison.” Sheriff Wilds warned. “Neil, I don’t know what you—”

“The door to the room the body was in,” Neil said impatiently. “How long had it been open?”

“You mean, how long has it been since you killed my husband?” The woman hissed through clenched teeth. “Dan, I don’t understand, why is he still in a cell? He should be on the tight end of a noose for what he’s done.”

“We don’t know that he’s the killer.” Sheriff Wilds said calmly.

“He’s been lurking in the building my husband was killed in for who knows how long, a building _I own_ , who else could it have been?”

“There was evidence that quite a few people had been…staying there,” Dan said uncomfortably.

“You mean the Minyards? Matt told me those monsters—”

“It wasn’t them.” Neil cut through her tirade. Monsters _had_ killed her husband, but the Minyards weren’t even close.  “How long was the door—”

“Would you shut up!” The woman rounded on him. “You murdered my husband and all you can ask about is a stupid door.”

“That door was the only thing keeping him safe.” Neil shot back. “If he’s the one who opened it, and judging by the state of his body I’d say he was, I need to know exactly how long that door has been open because the rest of us are screwed.”

 _He_ was screwed. For the first time in centuries, he was screwed.

“Calm down!” Dan interjected. “Both of you! Allison, go wait outside while I question him.”

“No. I want to stay. I want to hear what he has to say.” Allison responded.

“Allison, if he’s guilty he will face punishment, but there’s no evidence to say. You’ve proven you can’t stay calm, and it’s uncustomary for you to have even gotten this far. I need you to leave.”

Reluctantly, the woman did, but not without one last burning look at Neil.

Dan entered the cell and leaned against the wall across from Neil.

“Now. I need you to tell me what you were doing up at the house last night.”

“Why? That man has been dead much longer than that.”

This was a waste of time.

“Neil.” She said tiredly. “Why were you up at Wayhill Castle?”

Neil sighed. Before, he’d have been content to remain silent until she died and he could leave. But now…now, he was antsy. Anxious. He needed to be out there, moving...running again.

“I was looking around.”

“Why?”

“It calms me.”

“Why?” Dan pressed, eyebrows furrowed.

“It…reminds me.”

“Of what?”

“Does this have any bearing on the investigation?” Neil asked. He’d answer her questions if it meant getting out, but this seemed pointless.

“It might,” Sheriff Wilds answered calmly, and Neil sighed.

“The house reminds me of my mother. That’s why I go there.” He said in a rush.

“And what about the door? What’s so important about the door?”

Neil resisted the urge to ask again how long it had been open and replied, “The door is usually closed. That’s why.”

Sheriff Wilds waited, but no more of an explanation was forthcoming. His tapping foot kept track of the time that was passing.

“Did you know Seth Gordon?” She watched him closely for a reaction to the name.

“No.” Neil said. “Is that the dead man?”

“Yes.”

“How long was he missing?”

“I can’t tell you that yet, I need an honest account from you.” Sheriff Wilds explained. Neil sighed heavily with frustration again. “Were you aware that the property belonged to one Allison Reynolds?”

“I knew it had been bought, I didn’t know by who.”

Sheriff Wilds nodded.

“Wait, if he died on his wife’s property, how is it a surprise? How do you know she didn’t do it?”

“It looked like someone, several people, had been living in that room. Do you know who they might be?”

Neil paused for a moment, then leaned forward. “Yes, I did. If they got out, it means everyone is in danger. You’re a Sheriff, you’re supposed to protect Foxvale. Please, how long has that door been open?”

Sheriff Wilds regarded him strangely. “You mean to say…they’d been locked in?”

“Yes. And with good reason,” Neil said when he could see her morals acting up.

After a few more fruitless questions, she left, clearly perturbed.

Kevin came to see Neil that afternoon.

“They let my father out,” Neil said in a hushed tone. He didn’t trust that Sheriff Wilds didn’t have ears in the walls.

“It was bound to happen,” Kevin answered.

“Kevin…” Neil began, because a niggling suspicion had begun to fester in his gut. “Who hit me with the wagon?”

“Just a nearsighted old farmer, no one to worry about. He felt terrible.”

“Right,” Neil sighed, but he wasn’t convinced. His father could have been behind any number of wrong turns in his life, and Neil would have been completely oblivious. In fact, he was so off guard he probably wouldn’t have remembered them.

“Seth Gordon has been missing for two months,” Kevin said, “dead for about one. And there haven’t been any murders in the area, not the kind your father would be behind.”

“He wouldn’t be careless enough to leave a body,” Neil said. “How many people have gone missing in the last two months?”

Kevin didn’t have an answer for that.

A day dragged past, and then another, and Neil was about to transcend into a realm of hyperventilation and screaming when Andrew walked in. He leaned against the bars and stared Neil down. He was silent while Sheriff Wilds lingered worriedly in the doorway, until eventually she left and he said, “If you hang before you pay your debt what happens?”

“You dig me back up and I owe you double.”

“Right,” Andrew looked vaguely amused. “Whatever is happening has Kevin on edge.”

“Kevin is always on edge.”

“He is,” Andrew tilted his head. “How do you know him?”

“I don’t.”

“You’ve met before.”

“Not for a while.” Neil said.

“He stopped Allison from coming in here and killing you.”

“Sheriff Wilds is the one who usually does that,” Neil remarked.

“She thinks you killed her fiancé.”

“Maybe that’s for the best.” Neil said. “If she knew what really did it, she wouldn’t be able to sleep at night.”

She didn’t look like she’d been sleeping anyway. Andrew looked like he was considering it, or perhaps he was just blinking without expression.

He left.

After another day in holding, Neil was released. There was no evidence, Boyd said cheerily, that Neil had even been in town before a week ago.

Nicky, Aaron, and Kevin all confirmed that they’d found him in a roadside bush and carried him to the manor themselves. They hadn’t gone far enough into the house to see that there was a body. And, as Kevin explained quite colorfully to Allison one day, why would Neil keep going to the house if he wasn’t going to hide the damn body.

Given all that, Sheriff Wilds was turning the search to the people who had been in the room. The townspeople regarded Neil with suspicion, but Neil had been met with suspicion many times before and he was sure it would follow him for the rest of his days.

(However many of those he had left.)

-0-

He returned to the Inn, but the Inn had never been a place of comfort, and he turned right around again to leave. A heavy hand clamped down on his shoulder. Neil braced himself for Wymack but found Andrew instead.

“Dead in this town is the same as being dead in another.”

“It’s not.” Neil insisted, but let Andrew steer him to one of the barstools. When the warm weight left his shoulder, he remained, and hours later he found himself leaving with Andrew at the end of his shift.

“What’s in the room that would give Allison nightmares?” Andrew asked.

“The worst people you’ve ever met.”

Andrew didn’t seem to think much of that.

“Are the people in the room like you?”

Neil didn’t answer that and let his eyes wander to the shrubs on the side of the path.

“I mean; could they rise from the dead after being hit by a wagon?”

“They wouldn’t die.”

“What are you, anyway?”

“I have walked the earth for as long as it has existed, and I will continue to do so until it no longer does.”

“That’s not really an answer.”

“I don’t think there is one.”

“Bullshit.”

The interior of the cottage was nice, cozy even. There were a few handmade quilts embroidered with bee patterns, a sizeable fireplace, and a rocking chair by the window where Neil’s books were stacked.

A sound down the hall made Neil startle, but it was just Nicky leaning in from another room, slurring ‘in here’ and then disappearing.

It was a kitchen, surprisingly clean with a tea kettle and three full shelves of jam. Aaron, Nicky, and Kevin all sat drinking around a small table. Andrew pulled up a stool and joined them while Neil leaned against the wall to watch.

“We were just talking about how we don’t really think you killed that guy, since you were buried alive your first day in town an’ all.”

“Shut up, Nicky,” Aaron said without conviction.

“’Course, if you had killed him, that’d be fine. Seth Gordon wasn’t the best guy. Actually, he was kind of terrible.”

“Allison was the only one he treated with any kind of…humanity.” Kevin said.

“And that means something,” Nicky added, “coming from Kevin. But like we said, even if you did, we wouldn’t mind. Aaron killed someone, you know.” Nicky continued. “It’s why he can’t be the town doctor; he freaks people out.”

“Shut up,” Aaron said with more heat.

The rest of the night, Nicky drunkenly crossed lines and the rest of them got angry in turns, but they kept drinking and they didn’t walk away. It surprised Neil how well Kevin seemed to fit, considering he’d been locked in a dark tomb the past millennia.

Eventually, Nicky and Aaron wandered off, presumably to where they lived. Kevin followed after a long, wistful look at the couch.

The couch, as it turned out, he’d left for Neil.

Andrew retired without a word and Neil made himself comfortable before reading the rest of the night, unwilling to close his eyes to a world where his father might only be a heartbeat away.

 


	5. Chapter 5

The summer passed, and as Neil didn’t eat nor did he sleep, Andrew did not see any sense in charging him rent except for the cost of having to put up with him. Neil thought that was fair enough, and often went out of his way during patrols of the fields to find things of interest.

He brought back stones—both rare and common. Andrew started a pile off to the side of the porch where he would toss them when Neil offered. Not exactly keeping them, they were within arms reach, something Neil instinctively understood.

Neil would find leaves and flowers to make poultices out of. Aaron glared at them hanging in their neat line at the window, but Abby seemed enthused the few times she came to visit.

“Oh, I see what you did here!” She’d say, and Neil would politely answer her questions until she started in on things like ‘where did you learn this’ and he wouldn’t be able to answer. The clamming up was equally intentional as it was accidental. Maybe  _ unavoidable _ was the right word.

Nicky visited nearly everyday and Neil recognized the wistfulness in his voice. He wanted to be somewhere else, and it didn’t take Neil long to figure out where--Eric.  

“Just go live with him in his big city,” Neil finally said, “You have enough gold, I know you do.”

“It’s complicated…” Nicky looked troubled. “It’s just that I feel like something is coming. I don’t want to leave and find out later you guys needed my help.”

“You should go be happy,” Neil said.

“That’s not,” Nicky sighed, frustrated. “I want to. But that wasn’t the question.”

Then he would move on to teasing, and drinking, and telling old stories.  At sunset Nicky left, always dissatisfied but ever cheerful, and Neil would be left alone until Andrew came home.

It was surprising, but Neil started to understand why Kevin had stuck around. There was something about Andrew’s presence, something so reassuring that even when he was blatantly pretending you weren’t there, you felt comfortable.

Relaxed.

Neil was rarely relaxed these days, with one eye and one ear always open, one hand on his knife, and one foot forward ready to take off in a dead sprint. 

But there were moments, sitting around the small fireplace in rickety chairs with copious blankets, where Neil felt almost at home. Times on the porch when one of the stray cats would wander up to Neil and curl softly on his lap. Times in the morning where Andrew would lean out the window and pluck some honeysuckle, and work at harvesting the little drops inside until he was satisfied. Moments where Neil almost felt like he had a home.

Then he would remember the manor at the top of the hill, and his father who might be closer than that, and the ongoing murder investigation. 

He didn’t want to be tied down. 

Mostly, he stayed out in the woods and fields.

He would pass very close to the manor, but couldn’t quite bring himself to go inside. He wondered what Renee had seen, and if she could tell him, and eventually curiosity won out over caution. This was an important thing to know, anyway.

Surprisingly, or perhaps not, Andrew was up and waiting at the gate when Neil walked out at two in the morning. He barely spared a glance at Neil before walking.

It took less time than Neil thought it would to get to Wayhill Castle. 

Nathan was a hard man for shadows to hide, but Neil couldn’t relax. Neil wanted to check in with Renee, but Andrew made for the study.

The cell door hung open, still, and Andrew walked in without qualms. The walls were stone gray, and the floor was dirt. There were paths worn away where someone had paced into the ground. Several tunnels had been dug, then abandoned. After a moment of study, it became obvious that no matter which way they’d dug, the tunnel just came up in a different part of the room.

Neil stood in the doorway, bracing himself, half convinced that his father, or Lola, was watching. The air at his back felt charged.

He stepped in.

Neil had been swallowed by darkness before, pulled into the earth for an inscrutable number of years, but never like this.

“Empty,” Andrew concluded.

Neil turned to leave.

“Wait,” Andrew said, and reached up to something that had been hanging from the ceiling. A body; one of Nathan’s henchmen, likely. It wasn’t surprising that Nathan hadn’t been able to go without chopping someone up—it was surprising that he’d been able to kill. The only ones who could be locked in these tombs were like Neil. Everlasting.

He didn’t want to step forward to examine the body, he wanted to remain rooted near the doorway, but curiosity urged him forward.

The body was desecrated, hollow, and without a name or face to match in Neil’s memory. It moved, groaning through parched lips, and Neil froze.

“It’s alive,” Andrew said, without surprise or pity.

Neil studied it for a moment longer, then decided the body was of no consequence. It wasn’t someone who could hurt him. The limbs and eyes would grow back but not quickly enough to be a threat.

Then, the sliver of light on the floor began to wane. Neil cried out and launched himself as door swung shut.

It slammed and they were shrouded in darkness--complete and total darkness without end. Normally, it was no trouble to expand his senses and see in the dark, but not here. Not this darkness. This darkness refused to be seen. Neil threw himself against the door but it stuck. Andrew tried and he should have been able to open it, but it remained closed, which meant whoever had slammed the door had lodged something against the handle.

They pushed and pulled at the door, but nothing happened. The air was running out, it was stifling. A hand was pushing him to the ground, shoving his head between his legs, and Andrew was telling him to breathe, idiot, we don’t have time for this.

“You don’t have time for this,” Neil corrected. “I’ll be here forever.”

“Not forever. Kevin will figure it out. He’ll bring Aaron, they can get us out.”

“Kevin won’t open a tomb.”

“He will,” Andrew said, and Neil wished he shared that certainty. Eventually, Andrew sat back, “So, what happens if I die before you repay me?”

“I didn’t have anything else to offer, anyway. You don’t want riches, you don’t want knowledge. What else is there?”

“What else is there,” Andrew intoned.

“Eternity locked up with me,” Neil said. “Congratulations.”

Neil didn’t know how much time passed in that darkness. It couldn’t have been that long because Andrew resisted admirably when Neil invariably tried to start conversation. 

“Don’t you ever shut up?”

It stuck Neil as so contrary to his own character that he couldn’t help but laugh.

Eventually, there was a creaking and a groaning, a scuffling from where the body was, and Neil shivered. There were no ropes or cuffs, nothing in the room to restrain it. Neil just had to hope two against one would be enough.

It hadn’t looked short enough to be Lola, but the severe weight loss from starvation had likely changed all of them beyond recognition. Unless of course they’d chopped off the limbs for eating, knowing they’d grow back.

With time, everything turned back to its original state.

Time was a circle.

Everything was a circle.

Neil’s life was a constant cycle between light and dark, wakefulness and sleep, he would walk the earth again, just as his father did now. The thought calmed him, and he closed his eyes to wait.

He didn’t know how long it was before another sound jolted him out of his haze.

“Who was locked in here?” Andrew asked.

“My father. Lola. Romero. Jackson. Maybe more.” Neil answered, searching his memory for names and faces.

“And you think that’s one of them? Not another…thing?”

“Probably,” Neil said after a few moments of thought, then slipped back into his shadowy stupor.

The next time he woke, there was a knife to his throat.

-0-

This was a nightmare.

This was  _ the _ nightmare. The one Neil would have if he ever dreamed.

“Wake up, boy. You’re not sleeping through this,” his father’s voice promised.

For a moment, Neil refused to acknowledge that he was awake. This was a hallucination, it was a dream, it was any number of things but not reality. But then the knife sunk in, and Neil was forced to try and get out from under the weight.

“Nah-ah-ah,” Nathan relished the denial of freedom.

“Andrew,” Neil called.

“Andrew, the other one?” The knife slid up Neil’s cheek. “I never expected you to have a pet, boy.”

“He’s not--what did you--”

“Didn’t expect you to be stupid enough to walk in here without a mortal by your side.” Nathan chuckled. “But I suspect the world owes me  a bit of good luck by now, doesn’t it?”

The silhouette of a plan showed itself in Neil’s mind. Not a plan for him, but his father’s.

Because if there had been two bodies, Dan would have removed them both. Nathan had been put here long after the tomb had been opened. He’d put himself here, knowing Neil couldn’t stay away.

But Andrew…?

The apple. The apple he’d taken from the orchard on the first day. It was what Riko had given Kevin, it was what Jean’s cider had been made of.

Andrew couldn’t open the door because Andrew was no longer mortal.

Had he known? How much had Kevin told him? How could Neil have forgotten?

“Andrew!” Neil called again.

“He’s a pet, Nathaniel.” Nathan chided. 

Neil didn’t know what that meant, but he knew help wasn’t coming.

The knife dug in, and Nathaniel held back a cry.

“Do you know how long I have waited for this,” Nathan said, “The only thing I want more than to tear you apart is to find your bitch mother. And I will. Again and again, every time she is reborn, I will find her.” 

Nathan made promises, and threats, and then carried out those threats on Nathaniel. His control broke when Nathan lifted a stone in the darkness and crushed Nathaniel’s legs before cutting them off. He’d long since screamed himself hoarse by the time Nathan slit his throat, and his eyes had rolled back in his head by the time Nathan cut them out.

He was the rabbit again, and he’d been caught.

Pain sunk into his bones and made a home there, and Nathaniel accepted it. He stopped trying to mark time, and instead let each new injury wash over him free of any concept of ‘ending’.

“Now,” Nathan said calmly, “I am going to--ugh.”

Nathaniel did not know what was happening. New pain did not come, but the old pain had not left. He couldn’t move, or see, could only barely hear.

“ _ Ugh _ !” Nathan said again. “ _ Argh _ !”

There was a wet, gurgling sound, followed by hacking, and more wet gurgling, and by the time the sawing noises had stopped Nathaniel felt he’d regained some of his sense.

He sat up, or tried.

“Won’t let him get whole again,” Andrew’s voice panted.

“Andrew?” Nathaniel called a third time.

“Here,” a hand fell on his arm, and Nathaniel flinched before falling into it.

“You’re here.”

“Wasn’t going to stay unconscious forever, even if your father does hit like a brick wall.” Andrew sounded exasperated. “You really do sleep like the dead. Next time I call your name, I expect you to answer.”

“I will,” Neil promised.

-0-

He didn’t know how much time had passed before a sound from the other side of the door brought him hope. He and Andrew had a timekeeping system based on how quickly Nathan’s limbs regenerated, but it was hardly accurate and it carried a tension that Neil had no way of releasing.

No way besides settling down next to Andrew, almost touching, and hovering above the hazy place in his mind.

Light pierced through Neil, almost tearing him apart before he remembered to blink.

“Oh my god,” Sheriff Wilds was in front of him, Aaron pushing in behind and Kevin lurking just outside the doorway.

He felt her strong hands pulling him out of the cell, and then he could see the scorched and worn ceiling of the study. Andrew was beside him, much thinner, and Nicky was pouring water into his mouth.

"I knew I couldn't leave yet," Nicky tried to joke when he caught Neil's eye, but his eyes trailed down to Neil's blood soaked clothes and any further words stuck in his throat.

“Four days without water, one more would have killed him,” Aaron looked at Neil accusatorily.

Neil saw Boyd carrying out his desecrated father, who didn’t look much better than before, and he thought about warning them.

“Put that one back.”

As it turned out, the words were not from Neils mouth. Abby stood behind them all, surveying the scene with calm eyes.

“Pardon,” Dan looked shocked.

“Put it back.” Abby ordered.

“This man is injured, he is in serious need of a doctor!”

“He will not die,” Abby said. “His kind do not die. Now, put it back.”

Dan wasn’t going to.

Andrew leaned up, pulled his knife, and drove it into Nathan’s throat.

Dan yelped and Boyd tried to restrain Andrew. After a moment, the corpse began to breathe again.

“It’s…it’s not dead.” Dan said. “I don’t—“

“We need to go.” Neil said. “His people locked us in—we shouldn’t stick around to meet them again.”

“Oh, we will meet again. And when we do I will take care of them,” Abby promised.

“What--” The voice came from the doorway. “Is that what killed Seth?”

Allison.

Had everyone come up from Foxvale?

“I don’t--I don’t understand what’s happening,” Sheriff Wilds shook her head.

“Tea,” Abby said. “And, perhaps, an explanation.”

“No. Now. Explain now.” Dan ordered.

“Would you like to do the honors, Neil?”

Neil licked his lips. His throat had healed, and he found the words surprisingly quick on his lips. So he told them. He told them of an earth that had existed long before, of an immortal people, and forgotten magics, and a silent war. He told them about the tombs, about how they were opening, and how Neil did not know what would happen next.

Dan and Boyd looked troubled, but it was Allison’s reaction that surprised Neil the most.

“Get out of my house,” She said with watery eyes.

“ _ Your _ house?” Neil asked.

“Yes. Look what happened last time you left it empty. Someone needs to be here.”

“You’re volunteering?”

“Abby will find the others,” Allison said resolutely, “and I will guard the tomb.”

-0-

Neil had told the complete truth. He did not know what happened next.

The story wasn’t over; in fact, he had the notion that it was just beginning. But as he stood in front of the mirror, it felt a little like a goodbye.

Renee smiled.

“Don’t worry about me,” Neil said awkwardly.

“I always do,” Renee shook her head. “But I know Andrew. And I trust him with you.”

“You know Andrew?” Neil asked.

“He’s been visiting for months,” Renee told Neil with a gentle humor in her voice, and Neil thought of all the nights Andrew had come home just before daybreak.

“He never said."

“He doesn’t say much."

“No.” Neil shifted awkwardly. “And...you’ve met Allison?”

“I have,” Renee said. “I think we’ll get along quite well. I’ll be glad for the company. And so, I think, will you.”

Neil didn’t refute it. He was going to make good on his promise to Andrew--if Andrew called his name, he would be there. Neil knew that Aaron and Kevin felt the same, they would never leave so long as Andrew wanted them around. Nicky, however, had left for the big city that morning. It hadn't felt like a wrong parting, though. It felt right. It felt...almost happy.

“We’re going to find the others. The other tombs, and maybe Jeremy, if Kevin gets his way.”

“Well,” Renee smiled brightly. “I wish you safe travels.”

“Thank you.” Neil said.

He made to leave the room, but turned one last time, and opened the curtains.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well dang, I did it! I hope the wait was worth it!  
> I'm thinking of making this a series. I have some ideas about Ichirou and Jeremy, and there's an Allison x Renee thing I want to write. But nano and other fic idea's will come first, so it might be a while.


End file.
